Always Hers and Here
by volkslieder
Summary: Exploring the AU possibility of what might have happened if Much had come too late to prevent the marriage at the end of S1. Guy/Marian.


**Title:** _Always Hers and Here_  
**Rating:** G  
**Word count:** 470 words  
**Characters:** Guy/Marian  
**Summary:** Set in an AU future, if Much had come too late to prevent the marriage at the end of S1.  
**Disclaimer:** _Robin Hood_ is copyright to Tiger Aspect and the BBC. All Rights Reserved. No copyright infringement intended, no money being made.

**A/N:** Apparently I am Cleopatra, queen of DeNial. Because although I know how the finale turned out, my personal canon sort of pretends it didn't, in a multiplicity of ways. And this is one of them.

--

_The forest was dank, full of bare spaces and trees wet with fast-falling rain. The heat of summer day was lost to the empty cold of summer night. On the road out of Nottingham, a lone figure was walking slowly. His hood was pulled up over his head. There were no heavy sobs, no shaken unsteadiness of breath, only quiet and a sulking dark._

--

When Much ran in, red-faced and skull-cap half-off, everything plummeted. For a moment there was nothing, a blankness of time and quiet.

And then there was everything, suffocating layers of heat and sweat and shouting and fast-coursing thoughts. Robin must have worked something out, he must have had a plan, must have thought of something. But the ring was already on her finger. Much had arrived too late.

"It does not matter if the King is in Nottingham or not," the priest said. "It has no bearing on a wedding!"

On the priest's face, on Guy's face, on Marian's, was twisting reluctance and unhappiness. The priest, having married so many couples, praying harder for this one than before. Guy, looking at Marian through the lace of her veil, hating himself and his chosen path. Marian, despising lies, hating the liar she found herself alongside.

"Did you know this?" she asked him.  
"The priest is right, it has no bearing on our happiness." Every syllable was laced with pleading.

There was nothing to be said. She placed her hand stiffly down at her side, wedding-band tight on her finger.

--

She makes him raspberry pie for dinner; and sees that the juice of it has stained his tongue red.  
"Do you remember," says Guy, "when I brought you that horse?"

"Yes," says Marian, clearing away the plates. She doesn't need to; there's a servant girl she could call. But the laughter she heard outside before wasn't just her servant girl, and today she wants to let her be.

It is a slightly awkward memory to call up. That period of time; the continued forced acceptance of gifts, having to defend one man against the other and feeling inclined towards neither. Both were boys with men's desires, and it both angered and scared her. She was still a girl trying to make a woman's decision, and no-one seemed to understand.

Not even Robin. She remembers talking when they were younger, remembers conversations of dreams and changes; foolishly fancying they could affect the world about them. That's why he taught her how to fight. Her father taught her how to use a bow and arrow, just once. Sheriff duties kept him so busy; brought him home tired-eyed and slumped at the shoulders. Several times she opened her mouth to ask him. But as much as she wanted him to teach her, she would (_should_) rather watch him falling asleep by the fire.

So she ended up teaching herself, mostly. With some help from Robin. She liked the way it felt to fire it; the release and thumping sound of a hit on the target. The way she had to focus keenly and completely. That she could work and improve herself. That she controlled how good she was at it. The look of admiring envy from Robin the one time she beat him.

Robin understood that. He laughed at her when she asked him to teach her to wield a sword, and harder when she fell over in their first lessons. But he kept teaching her.

Marriage, she knew and knows, is nothing like the imaginings of minstrels. There is awkwardness and struggle and anger too, sometimes. And silences. But their hearts are in the right place. She knew that. Knows that. And it keeps her faithful. And the silences are much softer than they were at first.

Once, a long time ago, she wanted everyone to have a perfect ending, would make excuses not to listen to the minstrel ballads where true love died in each others' arms. Or was forced apart, sleeping two sides of an ocean. But now. Now she has grown content with this man. Sometimes irritable, sometimes quiet, sometimes frustrating, but always hers and here.

_When she thinks of Robin, she remembers a boy who ran away. There is a darkness between them, quiet and empty like the night sky above the sands where she imagines him to be._

--

_end._


End file.
